Scotland’s Gypsy Traveller Community

Part of the debate – in the Scottish Parliament at on 24 May 2018.

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Photo of Willie Coffey Willie Coffey Scottish National Party

I, too, congratulate Mary Fee on bringing this subject to the attention of the Parliament. She is a long-standing advocate and supporter of the Gypsy Traveller community and it is right that we recognise that today.

The disadvantage and discrimination experienced by the Gypsy Traveller community in Scotland is widespread with regard to access to housing, healthcare, employment and educational opportunities. It has been claimed that the discrimination against this community feels like the last acceptable form of racism—that has been mentioned already by members, because the maltreatment, harassment and community tension suffered by Gypsy Travellers is far more normalised and accepted than what is directed at other ethnic minority groups.

I will give a couple of examples. How would members have felt if, when they were children at school, they had one day received a letter from their teacher informing them that there was no point in teaching them as they were just going to end up tarmacking the roads anyway? Imagine the distress of a young man who is excited at the prospect of contributing to a community planning executive meeting only to be told, “Here’s your first lesson: nobody cares about the tinks”. Can members imagine being made to feel so ashamed of their ethnicity that they would not tell people about their background until they knew them well enough to hope that they would not react badly?

Those are just a few of the shocking experiences that have been relayed by members of the Gypsy Traveller community. They are examples of the daily discrimination that they face, and I am saddened to say that they are just a snapshot of the wider problem. Nobody deserves to be made to feel that they are less, especially because of their ethnicity. What should concern us is how reinforced and circular many of these instances are.

The lack of sufficient transit sites for Travellers usually means that they are compelled to stop somewhere that is probably not suitable, which brings them into conflict with the local community. I know that councils have tried to address that and some good work is being done, but a national solution might be needed to overcome the problem.

Poor health is a significant issue within the Travelling community yet, as Annie Wells mentioned, people experience great difficulty in accessing public health services, with GPs and dentists sometimes refusing even to register them as patients.

As we can imagine, experiencing such treatment so often and in so many areas of life has a devastating impact. Although little Scotland-specific data exists on the health of Gypsy Travellers, a report by the Equality and Human Rights Commission confirms that rates of mental ill health in the community are much higher than those in the wider population. The closest specific figures that we have to hand demonstrate the distressing correlation between inequality and mental health. Suicide among Irish Travellers was found to be six times the rate of the wider population, and a staggering 11 per cent of the community are lost to suicide. Life expectancy is alarming low at an average of only 55 years, as I think Mary Fee mentioned.

Many of us in the Scottish Parliament have shown that the concept of Scottishness is elastic enough to include all and any who wish to live and work in this wonderful country. Indeed, my great-great-grandfather Daniel Coffey came from County Tipperary in Ireland, probably around the famine years, and settled in Kilmarnock. My Irish friends have reminded me constantly of the links that I have with the Travelling community there. Perhaps most of us are migrants if we look back far enough.

In this Parliament, we have striven to welcome migrants and show our appreciation for the positive contribution that they have made in enriching and improving Scottish society. Colleagues have fought against the unjust deportation of those who have made their lives here, and we worked together to support a bill offering pardons to gay men with historical convictions. Can our one Scotland, many cultures ideal reach out and embrace the Travelling community, too? I think that it can, and it must, with a little bit of mutual respect for differing traditions.

“Tougher enforcement against Gypsy Travellers” might be the solution for some misguided politicians, but it would not take us one step forward in proclaiming ourselves to be the inclusive society that we aspire to be.

I thank my colleague Mary Fee once again for raising the issue in Parliament. Let us hope that our deeds reflect the positive vision that our words promise to so many of our Traveller companions in Scotland.